"How much?" Sam took out his wallet, the taxi just dropped us at our street.
"Twenty kid"
"What? that's too much" Sam only handed him five bucks. "The train station isn't even that far"
The driver is insisting Sam to at least give fifteen bucks, but Sam stands firm on his ground, he does that. I'm waiting for them to end their quarrel, when I feel a sense of tangle crossee my neck and I'm intimated to look, as I turned around— in a flash, a car swerved in our lane, speeding, and moved in an angle that made them slam the brakes, in little to no time the car crashed into a vehicle, a bike perhaps, sending shards of glass and twisted metal everywhere.
Sam turned back in horror and I dunked down as I flinched hard. Time seem to have been slowed down, my heart is racing, Sam quickly rushed to the scene, the driver of the car got out, he is shaken but conscious. The person sitting next to the driver is slumped over, bleeding from a gash on his forehead. But the man who was riding the bike is yet to be awoken, he's laying on the ground, covered in blood, the car happend to have crashed on his legs. "CALL 911!" Sam yelled, "SOMEBODY call an ambulance!" And while I can't even move, Sam pulled the man up, gave him his shoulder to grab on, and beseaten him down in the uber we came in.
"Come on Ifan sit, we have to hurry" Sam yelled, that's when my body broke the pause I felt. I get in and we head to hospital.
All our way there, this felt like a now or never situation, I'm shocked at how many people were only staring at him and not actually helping. "Fuck Ifan! He's the officer who negotiated me!" Sam relased a sharp noise of worry. "Really?" I let out a tense cry. We arrived at the hospital, our driver helped Sam get Officer out of the car, the paramedic team sends nurses and took him half way through, layed him on a stretcher, Sam walked with him all the way to the operation room, nurses in between kept checking his vital signs, pulse, blood pressure and oxygen saturation. The nurse there stopped us at the door. "You can't go in, you have to wait here."
"Yeah yeah, let us know please" Sam walked back and front intensely, I've never seen him that worried before but I can understand how he feels. I've spend half of my childhood in hospitals because of my Dad, as his cancer grew stronger.
The hospital walls remind me of how us humans are just a mere second of life, fragile, and unpredictably vulnerable. No matter how rich or poor we are, we're all equally weak and susceptible.
We waited for a while. "Is he going to be alright?" I ask Sam. "Let's hope that way buddy." He pets my shoulder when I see a tall man wearing black coat, and a hat to cover his face, walking in the operation room. "I thought we weren't allowed to go inside?" I whispered in Sam's ear. "Maybe he's family" Sam responded calmly.
"Get out of my way!" Chad ran up to us.
What the? where is he coming from?
"What happend?" I say "Where are you coming from?"
Chad is panting hard, he's distressed, almost as if we're in trouble again. What in the bloody hell earth?
"Your—" He breathes in "Your uncle is creating a scene." Chad puts his hand on his waist.
God.
"We'll be there." Sam stood up.
"What about the officer?" I say.
"He's in good hands now" Sam tapped my shoulder to keep me walking. "He discovered about Ayat, didn't he?" I ask chad while we take the elevator down.
Too much is happening in this little amount of time.
Is tonight the night my villain era will begin?
I lock breaths in, to be ready for whatever is yet to come.
-
We get out of Chad's car, Our neighbours are staring at us with a withal grim and not the nice kind. "Why are they–"
I finish Sam's sentence "looking at us right?"
"Keep walking" Sam softly pulled me by my arm, he knows how anxious I get around people. "Do you want to leave?" His voice becomes so gentle that sometimes I don't even recognise him. "It's okay, let's go home" all our way home, everyone in our neighbourhood kept on staring as if we're some kind of freaks, we've been living here since as long as I can remember, what happened now? they're gossiping, pointing at us, and for some reason, they're even getting angry. I feel like a rock hit my stomach and throwing up is a thought away. We soon got home after we tried to pretend like nothing was wrong, we see our house's door is wide opened, Sam spread his arm to slightly push me back to stop me from moving any further.
"I don't feel good. something's wrong, stay here." He took one step ahead but kept me behind, he's only a year older than me but acts like this. Sometimes I feel like I've grown to be depended on him because he always stands in the way to have me in the shades. Always been so protective of me, although after I took him home I should've been the one to protect him from all the harm, if only I had knew. He always bleeds for me, He's doing everything in order to provide a good life for the both of us but yet pretends like what he's doing is nothing. He hides his dripping blood behind the sound of water rushing down without knowing I've always been just a step away from the door and I hear him. Him pounding his fists at the floor, I've heard him. his cries in the shower I've heard them, always been. He makes it seem so easy but I know it's not, I don't know why or what I did to have him be that way to me, I don't think I ever deserved any part of this. I never asked him to. And in this particular moment I guess we both know what's about to come isn't going to be good to us. Our uncle I mean my uncle.. is standing in between the main door with his feet weighting down.
"Is something wrong uncle?" Sam is alarmed, without listening to what Sam was saying, my uncle shuts him down with his hand straight up in the air. "What am I hearing? Is it true?" My uncle stepped out, he has that uncomfortable calmness on his face. I open my mouth to say something but Sam starts talking before me. "sorry?"
"Those criminals showed up at our house?" Uncle's nostrils flared, he's staring straight at us. He's talking about Mr Faisal's men, isn't he? my hands shiver at the thought of us being caught. My lungs feel heavy and my neck is sweating. He'll kill us now, he is, isn't he? we are dead meat. "Why were they here? For money? What did you guys do to them?" Uncle is making any assumption possible, Sam's quiet, He doesn't correct him nor say anything, what is he doing!? say something Sam! From my ear to my brain, it hurts. Sam looked back at me "It's okay, it's okay Ifan I'll tell him" He told me as if he knows I'm shivering, My throat felt dry when he yelled "Tell me what?" Uncle's tone got even heavier. And when Sam doesn't respond in an instant Uncle dragged him by his shirt and head inside, yelling and abusing to make him talk, Sam is struggling to push uncle away, he forced his feet on the ground, but Uncle is much stronger than him, I rush behind them to stop him before he can hurt Sam. Everyone's looking at us but no one dares to step up to help us, they're all just as equally to blame as my uncle, I've always heard the silent is worse than the one doing, and now I've witnessed it, it is true, they're all guilty.
"Please uncle let Sam talk" I say, my voice shivered, but uncle already threw Sam on the couch. Sam's sweating, uncle's stood infront of Sam. "Please don't hurt him!" I cried.
He was about to take an action when we all heard glass shattering. Aunt's screaming, She ran downstairs crying, she's hitting her head in terror and kept on repeating the same thing "She's gone, she's gone!"
Is she talking about..
"AYAT?" Uncle yelled at her questing.
"She ran away, with all our respect, that badqerdar girl made a joke of us" Aunt cried and fell down on knees on the ground, uncle immediately ran upstairs to check if that's true,
it is true.
I look at Sam, we both run behind him to at least explain something, Uncle bang opened Ayat's room door, cracking half the door, he knocked everything down, including the shelfs, yelling her name as he destroyed the whole room like an animal. We both stay where we are, he stopped the destruction for a minute, inhaled a deep breath in and slowly turned to us.
"Did you two do this?" We say nothing, that made him hit me, making me fall over and I hit my back against the wall.
"Don't touch him" Sam yelled and pushed uncle, making both of them fall over the stairs, rolling down, Sam hits his head and Uncle stood before him, grabbing Sam by his shirt and punched his face, not once, but twice, and threw him onto the table, the glass table shatters. I ran down to him, I hit uncle with my bat, it didn't affect him a bit, instead he grasped my hair in his fist and pulled me up to him, my feet bearly touching the floor "ow ow ow" I scream, trying hard to make him stop, I with both my hands try to open his fists that are clenching my hair, "leave me alone!" I cry out loud, my voice is breaking, my anxiety shoots my nerves and I brust out in tears, I don't know what to do, he's not releasing me, Sam is not conscious. I don't know what hurts more, my uncle abusing me or my neighbours letting it happen. Why are my screams not loud enough to be heard?Why is no one helping us? why does this had to be us. I cry even louder in hopes, that someone might feel even a little empathy towards us.
Sam gets up, he's trying but there's glass pieces stuck in his back, He pulled some pieces of glass out and the cuts bleed down.
Uncle kicked us out of the house, yelling. "Never show up here ever again, If I ever see your faces again I'll make sure there is no face to be seen. You both are dead to me now." He spat, and Aunt cried again.
We're both laying on the ground, neither one of our neighbour is brave enough to help us out, we are wounded. It would have been close to being okay if we were adults who they were not helping but we're not, we're fucking children.
. . . .
We're at the the bridge. Cold, starving, and now homeless.
"What are we going to do now Sam?" I ask him. "I don't know buddy" He burries his face in his hands, unable to bear the weight of his emotions.
After we were left there in mud, chad came and helped us through his house, his parents were getting mad at him for taking us there, but he somehow convinced his parents to just let him at least bandage us. He helped us, we bandaged Sam's head, my wrist, my foot and Sam's arm.. and yes Sam's back was also covered In glass pieces, we took them out and plastered those as well. My foot was already in pain but it got worse when I was thrown down. We fought back but he's a grown aged man, We couldn't do much to defend us. We're both sitting now..
"We'll go to Mr Faisal, Tomorrow" Sam inched his chin. "But he said next Friday?" I say.
"We don't have anywhere else to go now Ifan, we have to."
"Why do you believe in Mr Faisal so much Sam?" I asked,
his jaw stiffened. "What makes you think that?"
"You favour him a lot"
"He's our only hope left"
"We can make other options available, you know."
"But he's the best option, you don't realise it" he changed his body posture to face me, "Imagine having cool cars, full new suits and money that we can spend on whatever we want" He seem so excited. "I don't care much about other luxury, but I do like cars, they're very brilliant. " I smile.
I have a bad feeling about that place, I don't want to go there. I've told Sam that several times but he do have a valid point, we'd have a safe space there. I hope that place brings good for us.
"Exactly my point! We can live. Not just breathe but actually live" His smile grew fonder, making his dimples appear. Almost every bit of us is wounded, yet he's smiling..
Whatever concerns I have for Faisal has got to go because If he's happy than I'm happy.
"Whatever is in your head, better not cost us our lives."
We've been through so much, maybe just maybe for once I don't have to be so dull, maybe for once things might go how we want them to be. I'm tried of feeling Petrified all the time. Maybe I should just accept that something nice can actually happen to us, maybe this can be good to us. Though nothing is ever good to us but I feel so— out of place every second of our lives, for him for me. Which is Pathetic. What Sam is risking is our peace that we never had, so maybe risking our lives every day for Mr Faisal will be what brings life to our souls. Maybe just maybe it'll be worth the danger.
Maybe I'll be able to face what I've been avoiding for so long, myself.
If he's thinking about us, than I guess, it'd be good. I trust him.
"Do you know why I view the sea and the sky at the same time." Sam looked at me.
"Why?"
"Because they are never ending, No one has ever seen the end of them, and looking at something so deep reminds me how small we human creatures actually are, and that my brother gives me hope, the will to just snap out of whatever remorse I'm feeling at the moment and I need to get ahead of it, because nothing in the world is deep enough to ruin yourself for it."
"You're just saying this because you had nothing to lose after your parents died." I turn my face away.
"I have you" His eyes fond deeper.
"When.. if by some reason you lose me, would you say the same thing?" I ask, fidgeting with my hands.
"That?" He blinked.
"That losing Ifan wasn't that deep.."
"But I'm not losing you"
"I hope it stays that way."
We're eighteen, we have our whole life ahead of us. We never know. We can never be sure of something we haven't lived.
"I would rather lose myself, than to let you go" Sam threw his arm around my shoulder.
"Ouch, don't come closer, it hurts."
"But I love youu" Sam dramaticly teased me. Purking his lips.
"You're an ass" I laugh. "Say it back" He playfully poked my head with his finger. "Heh that's ticklish!" I try to be mean but my laughter couldn't hold back.
"Say it back!"
"Say what back?" I ask, laughingly. "That you love me, too!" He nudged me. "Shut up" I roll my eyes. "Fine I'm leaving!" He tried getting up. "okay okay fine! I love you" I yell, because he's walking away. "Come back!" I run to him as I throw my arm around his shoulder. "I'm craving sushi" I say. "I despise fish" Sam gaggs, I laugh.
"So where we're going?"
"I don't know buddy, maybe Egypt? What do you say"
"Shut up" I laughed.